


White Light/White Heat

by Mad_Max



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Drug Use, F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, bad music mag pastiche
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-06
Updated: 2014-02-12
Packaged: 2018-01-11 10:51:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1172181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mad_Max/pseuds/Mad_Max
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>The past ten months have played witness to one of the most unexpected and thrilling twists in modern rock ‘n roll history. Previously overlooked and underappreciated, the French rock scene has exploded across Europe, North America and Britain, heralding a new-old sound and look in what many had come to consider a dying genre. In the eye of the storm stand ABC (Abaissé, French for ‘abased’), the wildly energetic and politically charged band that have taken the music world by storm with the release of their platinum album Who the f**k are the ABC.</i> NME, 2014</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I just really wanted to write a band au tbh. The first three chapters will be articles like this one introducing the three bands before the narrative begins.

NME -  _ Allons enfants de la patrie ! _  (2014)

 

_ The past ten months have played witness to one of the most unexpected and thrilling twists in modern rock ‘n roll history. Previously overlooked and underappreciated, the French rock scene has exploded across Europe, North America and Britain, heralding a new-old sound and look in what many had come to consider a dying genre. In the eye of the storm stand ABC (Abaissé, French for ‘abased’), the wildly energetic and politically charged band that have taken the music world by storm with the release of their platinum album  Who the f**k are the ABC . _

 

Enjolras, Abaissé’s model-beautiful lead singer and co-songwriter, is perched stiffly on a boxy IKEA sofa in the eclectically decorated and cluttered living room of the flat he shares with the band’s bassist, Combeferre. He has characteristically refused my suggestion that we meet in a restaurant (too loud) or in a café (why spend money on coffee when we can brew our own within the comfort of his cosy Parisian flat). So, here we are, dutifully ignoring the lukewarm mugs of coffee on the broken amp that doubles for a mini coffee table.

 

The tape recorder has been on for a full five minutes before Enjolras, apparently satisfied that he has filled his daily quota for glaring at journalists, decides to break the awkward silence.

 

‘We demand a return to the democratic values that provided the foundation for the Revolution,’ he says. It’s a well-rehearsed speech delivered with but a breath of the passion that has become a trademark of the band’s live performances. This is a familiar interview topic for the 20 year-old, who has become a voice for change and (often radical) political activism in the Western world. ‘Only several years ago, the French government implemented a policy of detainment and eventual deportation for people who had come here to work and live in peace. Europe has convinced itself that everything following the second world war, every policy, every law, every time a citizen was stripped of rights, or targeted for coming from the wrong neighbourhood, the wrong family the wrong country - everything is acceptable because we no longer operate in the name of fascism.’

 

He takes a drag of his cigarette, straightens his back, and stares at me for a moment before continuing: ‘The wolf in sheep’s clothes is still a wolf; he stills barks at the moon, and the president of France is no better than a fascist dictator if his primary aims are to increase his own power and influence while the country falls deeper into starvation. This is a starvation that begins with money and ends with the alienation of the poor, the foreign - the oppressed, the  abased . We don’t need a magazine to tell people about our band in a three page spread that costs more to print than any of its content is worth. Magazines should stick to news. Tell people what rights their government will strip them of today. Tell them what they can do to counter that, how they can fight against, how they can take the power out of the pockets of the CEOs of Deutsche Bank and Citi and put it back where it belongs - in the hands of the people themselves.’

 

Something in his eyes changes; now only several inches from my face, he jabs a finger at the tape recorder and continues with derision, ‘You should put that into your magazine instead of wasting the space describing what I was wearing and the lovely way my eyelashes frame my eyes.’

 

I ask him if he thinks the media have misrepresented the band and their mission by adding details like that to their stories.

 

‘We are activists,’ says Enjolras. I have the distinct impression that I’ve displeased him. His pale cheeks flush with colour. ‘We fight for political change - primarily - and the social changes that must come with it.  Along with that, we are a band. We make music. Who cares what colour t-shirt I wore today? Did you actually listen to anything I said? If you had, I don’t think we would be talking about this. If you don’t want to write about our music and our purpose, I don’t see why you’d bother to interview me at all.’

 

With some difficulty, I will refrain from mentioning that he is wearing his uniform black jeans, suit jacket and untied tie. I won’t go into detail about the way his eyelashes frame his unnervingly icy blue eyes, or the uncontrolled tumble of loose blond curls that he brushes from his face so often, I’m surprised to have been able to see his eyes at all. All of these things have been described with lovingly obsessive attention to detail by other writers in other magazines. It is doubtless these details that have lead to the widespread criticisms of  Abaissé  and the devotion to their cause that industry cynics have tagged as ‘cheesy’ and ‘melodramatic’.

 

That this would displease the singer is hardly a surprise. Beauty, brains and talent aside, if there is one thing uniquely Enjolras in the pool of young talent in this and other magazines, it is the fact that he is painfully and unashamedly  _ serious _  for someone of his background.

 

The son of French-born, Hollywood-based movie mogul Jean-Antoine Enjolras and once-actress Élodie de Poitiers, Abaissé’s lead singer grew up in the lap of luxury. He attended the prestigious all-boy’s boarding school, the Harrow School, which boasts of a long line of noble alumni, including the likes of Lord Byron, Sir Winston Churchill, Faisal II last king of Iraq, and even James Blunt. At Harrow School he met first Combeferre, the band’s placid philosopher and bassist, followed by Courfeyrac, the band’s heart and drummer, poet, lyricist and guitarist Jean Prouvaire (the only member of Abaissé who doesn’t seem to mind being addressed by his first name - ‘ _ Jehan _ ’ he stresses, ‘Jean’ is his father) and finally guitarist Feuilly, who is the only member of Abaissé not to have been born into wealth and privilege.

 

Hardly the makings of a group devout  _ soldats de la démocratie _  (as they have been dubbed by their fans on Twitter and Tumblr). But, the five soon made a name for themselves as rabble-rousers and troublemakers at school, leading to Courfeyrac’s and Enjolras’ expulsion at the ages of 16 and 17 for their involvement in the violent G-20 protests that wracked London in 2009. This only marked the beginning of a long and  serious  conviction to the beliefs that have seen every member of the band behind bars at least once. The  _ seriousness _  and genuine earnestness have become their trademarks. They are young idealists, convinced they fight for the most noble and righteous of causes, and they don’t appreciate media attempts to make them seem, well, a bit more cool.

 

I mention this just as bassist and physics major (he has since changed his course of study, I am told, but to what is unclear) Combeferre enters the living room from his miniscule bedroom beside the kitchen. He fixes me with an unreadable expression from over the top of a book printed in a language I can’t recognise and says evenly, ‘If we wanted to be cool, we wouldn’t be making music like ours. We’d be buying whatever album from whatever band you would be trying to sell in our place.’

 

Our conversation fades into an awkward silence. After enduring another ten-minute bout of the infamous Enjolras glare, I turn the tape recorder off, wish the guys a good night, and get their assurances that we are still on for a band interview the following night at their Montmartre-based studio.

 

 

The following afternoon finds us in the comfortable, sunlit room the band write, rehearse and record all of their material in. We share a beer (Enjolras, who staunchly maintains his sobriety, drinks coffee). At length, the tape recorder comes out, the questions roll in, and the band’s clash of personalities becomes apparent.

 

** There was a lot of hype as you released your first album,  Who the f**k are the ABC,  and a lot of controversy regarding the choice in title. What do you think about that? **

 

 ** Enjolras: **  We don’t think about that.

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   I thought it was very exciting. We wanted to make a statement with the title, and we did.

 

** What kind of a statement were you trying to make? **

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   I think it’s kind of obvious. We’re misrepresented a lot by the media. You know, when we started, no one knew who we were - we played our firsts gigs in the back of a university café - but by the second or third gig, people started coming to see us. We started getting discounts on our drinks for all the business we were bringing them; it was great. With all seriousness, though, we felt like we had reached people, and they were listening to what we had to say. We didn’t have to sell them anything; we just had to play our music.

 

 ** Combeferre ** **:** You sell people a product.

 

 ** Courfeyrac:  ** We are that product, or what you make us out to be. Which isn’t us at all. We don’t want to be the new kings of rock. What does that even mean? That someone who read our press kit decided he likes the idea of us and thinks everyone else should too? That’s not the point of our music. We want to reach people, and the media could have helped us with that, but instead we’ve been sold as an outfit and a CD people can buy at Urban Outfitters to feel  like they might be into politics, maybe, a bit.

 

 **Combeferre:**   We read an article from NME one day that called us ‘ABC’. The French pronunciation of Abaissé sounds like those letters, and the journalist must have misunderstood -

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   It’s almost like he did it on purpose, just to prove our point.

 

 **Combeferre:**   So we decided to work with that. We wanted people to listen to our music and get to know us that way, rather than through a magazine article that couldn’t even get our name right. It was Enjolras’ idea.

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   He likes puns.

 

** That’s actually surprising to hear. **

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   Isn’t it? Everyone think we’re these iron-fisted, cold-hearted idealists -

 

 **Feuilly:**   Or rich assholes.

 

 ** Courfeyrac:  ** But really, we’re very normal, for all the media attention and the fact that our names are at the top of the No Fly list. Enjolras has finally learnt how to cook his own Easy Mac. Combeferre likes to listen to Patsy Cline in the bathtub -

 

 **Combeferre:**   Courfeyrac is impossible.

 

 ** Courfeyrac:  ** Seven albums. I wouldn’t like to be responsible for his water bill.

 

They eye one another for a moment.

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   Make sure you get that down, that he pinched me, in case I have to sue.

 

 **Feuilly:**   The point is, we’re really normal guys. I don’t think you have to be some flaming quadriga god or priest of the ideal or something to believe in and fight for something worthwhile. We don’t want to be that. We don’t want to be idols. We want to be accessible to people everywhere, to kids who download our music illegally on a shitty Dell just as much as the kids like we were at Harrow. We’re human beings like our fans, and we’d like people to know that. There’s a lot more universality in that than there is in, for example, a group of scruffy guys in expensive ripped jeans and leather jackets looking like rockstars on the cover of Rolling Stone.

 

** Speaking of, you’ve recently caused a bit of a stir in the music world with your opinions on illegal downloading. What was that all about? **

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   It was all about our opinions on illegal downloading.

 

 ** Enjolras:  ** We support illegal downloading. Our label doesn’t.

 

** Of your own music, too? **

 

 ** Enjolras:  ** Especially of our music.

 

 ** Feuilly: **  Like I said, we want to be accessible. Not everyone can afford to spend 9.99 on an album, on music. The answer to that is always and has always been: ‘tough luck’, and we think that’s bullshit.

 

 ** Enjolras: ** The music industry is a profit industry. It’s business and bad politics. We won’t support that.

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   We don’t make music so our producer can snort mountains of coke in the back of his limousine.

 

 **Combeferre:**   Which I’m sure he doesn’t.

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   He’s charming, really. So’s his wife. Love you, Stéphan.

 

** Apparently there were also problems with MTV last week. We weren’t able to reach them for a statement. Care to explain? **

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   You’re asking all the wrong questions.

 

** Am I? **

 

 ** Combeferre:  ** Not really. What Courfeyrac means is that the MTV thing was slightly complicated.

 

 **Enjolras:**   It wasn’t complicated. We don’t belong on a stage with Volupté. That’s it.

 

** Do you think your music is too different? Or is there something personal? **

 

 ** Enjolras:  ** Their music is nothing like ours because they are nothing like us. They support nothing. Their lyrics mean nothing. They’re proud of that, of the fact that they create empty sounds and sell them to people at industry prices.

 

 ** Combeferre: ** Well, below industry prices.

 

 **Enjolras:**   I don’t care. If we’re going to perform for something like the MTV awards, we are not going to be doing so with the likes of Volupté.

 

** The lead singer of Volupté was recently quoted claiming he wouldn’t mourn the death of your careers if you decline the performance. **

 

 **Enjolras:**   The lead singer of Volupté is a drunk, an addict and an idiot.

 

** He recently got out of a potential prison stay for possession, I think. **

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   Oh! No, that doesn’t sound surprised enough. Can you write ‘they respond with surprise’? I don’t think I can act this one out.

 

 ** Enjolras:  ** Abaissé will not be performing for the MTV Awards if Volupté are, end, point. They can make all the bad choices in the world on their own time, but we don’t stand for parties and mindless melody. We won’t involve ourselves with a band like that.

 

 ** Combeferre: ** To be fair, the last thing that I think about when I wake up is whether or not Grantaire would mourn our dead careers, should we fade out.

 

 ** Enjolras: **  We won’t.

 

 

Up until this point, lyricist and part-time lead guitarist (the other leads are shared with co-guitarist Feuilly) Jean Prouvaire has been maintaining his silence from a corner chair. I guess that this has something (or everything) to do with the glass pipe on the table beside him and his fire-engine-red eyes (his stare is unnerving). Our conversation seems to have reached him at a delay. He leans in now, reeking strongly of some admittedly quality weed, and says:

 

 ** Jean ‘Jehan’ Prouvaire:  ** This isn’t Harry Potter.

 

** I’m sorry? **

 

 ** Prouvaire: ** ‘Neither can live while the other survives’; I think it’s unfair that magazines try to pit us against our opposites. Volupté are nothing but the obverse to our band, the reverse, the other side to the magnet. We wouldn’t have appeal without the contrast. The world needs extremes. Volupté aren’t our enemies. They reflect back everything that we are, and we onto them - what they are not. It’s not ‘two halves makes a whole’; we are whole. It’s ‘heads or tails’. Only assholes carry around two-headed coins. We don’t want to trick anyone, and neither do Volupté. We’re all ourselves. We’re here for our music and our message. Don’t print any of this; it’s all ripped from the Romantics.

 

 **Courfeyrac:**   Jehan’s a big fan.

 

 **Prouvaire:**   Chateaubriand or nothing.

 


	2. All of tomorrow's parties

Rolling Stone, All tomorrow's parties (2014)

 

The phone rings just as I am being shown to my seat in a back booth at the recently overhauled Café Boulud in New York’s Upper East Side. At the other end of the line, Volupté’s drummer, French-born Bahorel, informs me of the last-minute change of plan. His voice comes crackled and muffled through the line, as though he hasn’t bothered to take the phone from his jacket pocket. He promises to send an SMS with the address to the bar in which we will now conduct our scheduled interview.

Fifteen minutes and one glass of overpriced wine later, I give a disgruntled taxi driver the address to an exceptionally seedy-looking dive bar in the East Village. Bahorel is there to greet me as I exit the car. Laden with beer, which he offers me by way of hello almost before my feet touch the ground, he snaps the door shut behind us with an elbow and uses the other to shoulder us through to a table he’s claimed in a far corner.

He insists we begin with the interview the minute we reach the table. But, why the change of plan? And where are the rest of the band? I am informed, rapid-fire, that guitarist Joly is home sick with food poisoning and “Grantaire doesn’t like to miss out on restaurant interviews”.

The singer and songwriter is said to have become a fixture at various prominent cafés and restaurants since moving to the city last August. He has gone so far as to claim this affinity for sensuous pleasure as the origin of the band’s name, ‘Volupté’. It is almost too fitting. With their fine dining, heavy drinking, free-wheeling habits, Volupté are voluptuaries of the highest order. I share this thought with Bahorel, who slams down the rest of his beer with a wide grin and offers to kick my ass at billiards.

We adjourn to a pool table. Bahorel seems to occupy twice the amount of space that his wiry frame should require. He is a blur of hand gestures and rapidly changing expressions in a stunningly scarlet t-shirt emblazoned with the name of a band he professes to have stopped listening to when he dropped out of university to commit himself to Volupté’s first European tour in 2012.

“I don’t miss them,” he says, and promptly sends three balls flying into pockets at either side of the table.

True to the band’s reputation for volume, violent opinions, and a vocabulary that would put your alcoholic grandmother to shame, Bahorel has no qualms about sharing his thoughts with the tape deck. Struggling to overcome the thick French Canadian accent that renders half of what he says virtually unintelligible, he confides that he finds Manhattan infinitely more exciting than Montréal, which is “boring” and “covered in dog shit”.

Shit like Brooklyn-based electropop group Pr1ests, with whom he is rumoured to have had a physical altercation after tearing down one of their posters advertising a gig at the Bowery Ballroom last week?

“Fuck Pr1ests.”

I assume, wrongly, that he is not a fan of their music, and he is quick to rectify.

Taking a long swig of his beer, he lays a hand on my shoulder, stares me straight in the eye and says, “I don’t care about electropop or hipsters or the Bowery Ballroom. Make your music on the computer if you want. Eh, do whatever you want, but don’t tell people what kind of music to like. I don’t need to tweet Pr1ests to ask their permission to listen to the Egg on a Friday night. Fuck them.”

  
For the following three hours, he taunts and teases me over a seemingly never-ending game of pool and an equally never-ending flow of beer. It is nearing two in the morning by the time we return to our table, and I’m surprised by how much time has passed over a game that we haven’t yet finished playing. The sentiment is not shared. Despite the energy bursting to escape from every pore in his body, Bahorel likes to take an astounding amount of time with everything that he does.

“I went to college for five years, but I never got a degree.”

Why?

He shrugs. “Didn’t feel like it yet. A degree in what? I studied law, but I had a motto: ‘Never a lawyer!’ And then I dropped out.”

 

We reconvene the following evening at a similarly shady dive in Brooklyn. All but Grantaire are present, the circumstances of which are explained to me in slightly vague terms by bassist, L’aigle (the Eagle).

“He won’t answer his phone. He could be asleep, but he might be out walking,” shrugs the Quebec native over a plate of greasy-looking bar grub.

I ask if we should wait for him to show up or start the interview. Exchanging glances that are parts-uncertain, parts-determined, the band opt to wait at least another hour for their elusive fourth member to dredge himself up from the shadowy depths of his one bedroom Brooklyn apartment (if he is there). His behaviour seems to have annoyed all and surprised none of the trio, who bonded over a mutual interest in shitty bars, cheap liquor and ‘bad music’ at the University of Montréal four years ago and have been inseparable ever since.

They trade drinks and banter over the oversized plates of hamburgers and oil-slicked fries that occupy much of the narrow table. Joly, Volupté’s youngest member at just 22, is an eclectic mix of neuroses and pure, unadulterated cheer. I catch him peering at his reflection in the back of a spoon. He smiles.

“I like to check regularly, just in case.”

Check for what?

“Blemishes. Mouth cancer. Gingivitis. Hairy tongue.”

He seems genuinely relieved to have found himself cancer-free, and offers to buy my next drink in celebration. This is but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the members of Volupté and their quirks. When asked, however, Joly admits that it hasn’t always been smooth sailing.

“I had a lot of trouble the first time we went on tour. I was just getting into this crystal healing stuff and magnets and non-alcoholic ionic beer, which is nothing you can keep up on a tour bus with four other guys, you know?”

“We’d all wake up in the middle of the night, parked on a festival ground or something, to the engine humming,” throws in L’aigle, snaking a hand around his friend’s shoulders in a loose one-armed hug. They share a look with Bahorel, who snorts and nods in remembrance. “He’d be turning the bus around to face North, so the magnetic fields could run through our circulatory systems or whatever, and Grantaire would go crazy, and then we’d all end up just waking up and having a beer. I don’t think we ever got a decent night’s sleep on that tour, actually.”

Did that ever cause tensions between them?

“Not really,” L’aigle answers with the unencumbered certainty of someone who has never had to fear for the security of his future.

What if the band had broken up?

He counters with a philosophy that is either very wise or very stupid and almost definitely a result of the copious amounts of alcohol he’s consumed since we sat down:

“Unlikely, but if it had, I mean, it was a great experience, you know? I don’t like to dwell on the negative consequences of things; I gambled away my life savings on my eighteenth birthday. $10,000. That was shit, but it meant I couldn’t go out west like I wanted, and I ended up studying in Montréal and met the guys instead. So, I think, yeah, shit can happen, maybe the band will break up, maybe we’ll get lucky, maybe the world will end tomorrow - who knows. People are always so afraid of what will happen, but I just assume it will, and then it’s like, ‘eh, do your worst’. I’m ready for it. I’ll live.”

This same speech has been delivered in a similar fashion in countless other interviews, and L’Aigle, sipping his beer, seems unwilling to go any further as I raise the topic of an article about his love life that has been circulating the web of late. Before things can get awkward, the conversation changes route suddenly; the air has gone cold in the bar, and I turn my head just in time to catch the root of this evil on his way in through the open door.

Grantaire is taller than he appears, slouching and scruffy and almost hidden behind his fellow bandmates, in magazine editorials. He is wearing a thrift shop denim jacket that is ill-suited to the snow storm brewing outside and vibrantly red Cobain-style sunglasses that peek out from beneath his unruly mop of hair like ladybug shells. Far from the smouldering sex-god that is expected of young rock idols, he is pudgy and slightly scuzzy with dirty fingernails and deep bags under his eyes that, L’aigle assures me, were not designed by Chanel.

“Traffic was bad,” he says by way of excuse, then goes on to explain that he arrived on foot. He reaches for and downs Joly’s beer on autopilot, takes his sunglasses off, blinks at us briefly, and shuffles off to the bar for a drink of his own.

After a brief and uncomfortable silence, Grantaire returns with a bottle of Wild Turkey, which he sets in the middle of the table along with four empty glasses.

He turns to me, his hands pouring out a double, neat, his eyes peering into mine, and asks loudly if I’ve ever considered myself a fan of Papa Roach. Something tells me that now is the time to press ‘RECORD’ on the tape deck; I do so.

What follows is a two-hour long rant on a variety of subjects that I am largely unable to follow. Around us, the others continue to drink and chatter, breaking in occasionally to tell the singer when he should put a sock in it, only for him to plough on in his loudest outside voice.

The thing about Grantaire is that he is much too easy to mistake for a rambling drunk who has reached those final stages of inebriation that prelude a long and dreamless sleep. He is a shapeless mass of strong opinions, obscure references and a surprisingly dark, witty and offensive sense of humour that, coming from the mouth of a walking whiskey distillery, all but begs to be misunderstood. He catches me sharing these thoughts with an equally intoxicated L'aigle.

“Fuck you and the increasingly irrelevant culture mag you rode in on.”

“Excuse me?”

He leans in so that we are nose to nose, his eyes wide and slightly crossed as he attempts to stare into both of mine at once. His breath is terrible, and up close I can see the ragged patches of stubble on his cheeks, left over from an uneven shave.

“I just passed a Trader Joe’s that gets more traffic than a no-charge amateur porn site, and they probably sell more chips in a week than our label puts out records. Do you think I’d be sitting here for this interview if I didn’t have to pay off my fucking Sky bill or risk missing out on the next episode of Teen Wolf?”

Around us, the others lower the volume of their own conversations to eavesdrop. I get the feeling that they are waiting for a signal - from Grantaire or from myself - to spring in and restore the peace. Grantaire, for his part, seems either not to notice or to care. He is in particularly vitriolic form tonight, the words avalanching from his tongue in a half-jumbled, saliva-coated mess.

He strikes a dramatic pose, both elbows on the table, eyes narrowed as he rattles off the long and inventive list of my crimes. My greatest flaws seem to be the lack of financial support I offer him, the fact that I am not one of the ‘salt of the Earth’ young fangirls who fund his drug habits by purchasing Volupté merchandise and CDs, that I have the gall to record this interview on a tape recorder in 2014. These are admittedly valid arguments that he raises, though hardly the point of this rant, nor, I doubt, its cause. Far more, I am struck by the raw frustration with which he describes journalists and the media in general.

“You people are like natrium, and I’m about to go into cardiac arrest from overexposure. I’m not sitting here for you,” he says in one breath, takes a deep drink, returns to the subject of my jeans (“Whose reputation did those cost you?”); for all the breath he is expending projecting onto my outfit, it is clear to me that Grantaire’s main concern is that he has no idea how to navigate an interview situation in his current emotional state. As far as musicians in his genre go, he has a reputation for being fairly entertaining, albeit moody company - far from the aggressive, glassy-eyed drunk across from me. There is a brief respite as he picks up my drink; he hesitates as though unsure of whether to throw it at me or drink it himself before handing it back to me almost sheepishly and confessing, “I’m going to come off like an asshole in this anyway.”

“Why?”

“Don’t bullshit me, Steve.”

“Kevin.”

“Kevin.” An eye on my drink, clearly regretting his decision not to upturn it in my face. “What are you, a Power Ranger? You already know what you want to write about us. Put your claws down - don’t argue. Everything I say here is just the buffet you get to pick and choose from. I’m making your argument for you. What do you want to know? Am I going to jail? Ask the jury why not. You think I’m getting off easy. Call me Peter, you’re the wolf. Voluptuaries, Libertines - what’s the difference? ‘I’ve heard there were tensions, when is the band going to break up’ - you’d love that. You’re like vultures. That’s the media. That’s the industry. Stretching out your claws, waiting to sink your beaks into the virgin flesh of Next Big Thing. You’ve been waiting for us to go up in smoke since the first interview was printed off. Tell you what, since my drummer is tugging on my sleeve like he needs to go pee-pee: I’ll call you up when we split if you promise to have your article engraved on our fucking tombstone. ‘RIP Volupté: Free-wheeling, loud-mouthed whatever-its with 70’s haircuts, sounded like Lou Reed and Iggy Pop had a baby with Edie Sedgewick’s dance moves and the sex-appeal of a bout of goiter. Not missed.’”

He reaches across the table, turns off the tape deck, and cranes his neck to respond to a grumbled “oh, shut up” from L'aigle. I take this as a sign: interview over. The group fall into a conversation about an incident that had their internet fans buzzing all weekend.

Grantaire (he claims he was high; his bandmates shake their heads and ask me not to put that in print) bought himself tickets on Thursday night to a gig by French rock band Abaissé.

“I thought it was Arctic Monkeys,” he huffs, but the vitriol of his previous rant has been replaced by an air of bemusement and mild frustration.

That frustration led him to approach the band’s manager backstage and demand a refund. According to sources, the resulting argument was so loud it attracted the attention of Abaissé frontman Enjolras, who personally refunded the singer (15$) and had him escorted to the door. Now, Grantaire is in hot water with his own manager, French has-been, Antoine-Jean Gros. His behaviour is believed to be the direct cause for Abaissé’s recent and quite vehement refusal to play with Volupté at the MTV Awards in August.

“That’s Enjolras’ problem, not mine, if he doesn’t want to perform with us. But, don’t expect me to go to his funeral when it kills his career.”

“It will be fine,” says L'aigle with evident pain. Joly returns to our table from the bar. Another round of drinks.

It takes surprisingly little for the band to prod their singer back to relatively good humour. By the next round, he is clapping me on the back and asking me where I bought my wristwatch. He tells inappropriate jokes and attempts to kiss all of us on the cheek - missing twice, in the case of L'aigle and myself, though he wipes our lips with his sleeves and flirts clumsily before knocking back a complimentary shot of Jägermeister (“Jawohl!”). By the fifth round, he has disappeared entirely, bumping into all of us, clapping us enthusiastically on the back before ducking outside for a smoke.

“He’s a good guy, a good friend,” insists L'aigle, while Joly nods.

When he does not return in time for the sixth round, I follow his tracks past the small cluster of shivering hipsters breathing clove-scented puffs of smoke at one another to an otherwise empty stoop around the corner. Grantaire notices neither my presence, nor the cold that has turned his fingertips blue. Swearing, he taps feverishly at the screen of his phone, flicks away his cigarette, and takes off down the street.

Inside, the others are unimpressed.

“I’ll pay his tab,” says Joly with a shrug. “We drink here because it’s cheap, anyway.”

  
Grantaire knocks on my hotel room door next afternoon.

“My manager gave me the address.” He runs a hand through his nest-like hair and continues to hover awkwardly in the doorway even after I invite him in.

Did his manager send him over?

His eyes harden. “No.” He scratches the back of his neck, his expression reminiscent of a child who has been made to apologise to a neighbour for riding his bike over the lawn. “Look, my manager was blowing hot air into my ear all day yesterday for the MTV thing, and the last time we did an interview, the guy was as friendly as a water moccasin. I mean, journalists are vampires - usually.” A pause, his fingers fiddling with the hem of his t-shirt (red and splashed with the word ‘Abaissé’ in all caps).

“So, yeah, I was pretty pissed off last night - not at you, just, at journalists I guess as a faceless mass, and I mean, I kind of suck in interviews. I don’t know why anyone bothers with musicians. Buch of assholes who can’t talk, being interviewed by people who can’t write, for the buck of people who can’t read. Or whatever. Anyway - ” Stepping into the room, he flicks the lamp on and off, studies the TV Guide. “Whatever you write, I'm sure I'm going to hell in a denim jacket at this point, or however that song goes. Put my foot in my mouth, etc etc. That's why I hate interviews. I always fuck it up.”

Before I can respond, he is back to hovering in the doorway.

“I guess you can print this - you will anyway.”

  
Three days later, I am piecing together this article on my laptop when the doorbell rings. A delivery from edible creations. I buzz the guy up.

Nestled between two of the fattest chocolate-covered strawberries I have ever seen is a folded card with a cartoon Power Ranger striking a pose on the outside. I unfold it.

The inside reads: Steve. I know that's not your Real Name etc etc, manager pronounced my last apology 'unacceptable', he's journalistphobic, write us a good review, I have a sensitive ego, this is a run-on sentence, good luck w/ ur life buddy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. The peter/libertines remark is a reference to Peter Doherty, who gets smashed a lot in the press for his drug habits and also to Peter's problems having brought about the end of the Libertine's era. 
> 
> 2\. Volupté's manager is Gros, yes.


End file.
